Fun Friday at Wally World!

I knew that Friday would be busy at the Lake City Social Center; Wally World. It was, after all, the end of a long work week for most and the start of a long weekend for others. Everyone in town was in the store.

I didn’t go in until four o’clock. When I got there I got to stand at the self-service check outs. Let me tell you, this is loads of fun!

We were waiting for Dayna to arrive in town. Coming up from Orlando for her little sister’s birthday was a welcome thing after all the hours she had been working. Thursday Dayna spent the day at the sevice station having her car looked over before she made the trip up to LC. While she was there she was informed that two of the motor mounts were gone and her car wasn’t safe to drive. Three hundred plus dollars later, her car was safer and running well, with some advice from the mechanic that tires should be next on her list.

She set out Friday afternoon for Lake City, Mary anxiously awaiting the arrival of her sister. She hadn’t seen her in a while and had a whole list of things to show her.

Around five o’clock Bill and Mary showed up at WalMart. I knew he would be in to get a couple of things for dinner, so I wasn’t too surprise. That is, until Bill told me that Dayna had broken down and was at a gas station near Ocala! She said her car was acting really weird and she was losing power. So she did the right thing and pulled off the interstate and called dad.

The people at the gas station were very kind. They let her use the phone as much as she needed. Her cell phone works in Orlando, but cuts out when she gets too far away.So Bill and Mary headed south to see what was up with Dayna’s car. It’s about an hour or so away, so Dayna would be waiting there for a while. I stood at the self-service checkouts worrying about Dayna and her being stuck there in Ocala.Shortly after nine o’clock I see them coming down the front aisle of WalMart, all tired but smiling. Bill checked out the car and thinks it just got really hot. He added some transmission fluid as it was low and he drove it the rest of the way up here while Dayna and Mary followed behind in our car.

My relief was instant! Dayna was safe. Tired and a bit PO’d, but safe. Another life lesson learned for her.

They picked up a few things there at the store, we visited while I had a break and then they headed home. I went back to the ever-exciting self-check.

It wasn’t but a few minutes later when I hear a commotion toward the middle of the check out lanes. Voices are raised, sounds like an argument. Then a sea of WalMart personnel come running from all directions, I see their blue shirts, hear their keys jangling as they are running full speed from all over the store to this scene of this argument.

I don’t don’t what is going on, but it’s getting louder.

I went up to the center aisle and kept people from heading in that direction.Then I see this crowd of management escorting a couple people down the aisle toward the door. There is still yelling going on and someone protesting their treatment. They keep yelling at the guy to take it outside. There was an older couple sitting on the bench just near the exit and I asked them to move. Not knowing what was really going on, I didn’t think they should be right in the path of this entourage coming toward us.

They managed to get the guy outside. I don’t know what happened after that. The management hung around the door for a while and some customers were a little reluctant to go out to the parking lot by themselves so we had them walked out by other employees.

I never found out what had actually happened, but I was very impressed by the speed at which the management converged on the situation and had it out the door in very little time. They stayed in the area, also, to make sure the incident didn’t ignite again.

I went home shortly after that to my nice quiet house. Bill had to go back into work around midnight to receive a plane that was due in for maintenance. It was a late night for all of us.